


have you ever imagined killing your brother?

by FarFetchedFiction



Category: Sanders Sides (Web Series)
Genre: Angst, Creativitwins, Gen, Hurt/Comfort, Implied Unsympathetic Patton, Injury, Patton did the split, Patton mention, Pretty much just a headcanon for the stuff post split but pre DWIT, Remus has Intrusive Thoughts, Roman and Remus share a room, Self Harm, Sympathetic Dark Creativity | Remus "The Duke" Sanders, Sympathetic Deceit | Janus Sanders, Sympathetic Morality | Patton Sanders, Tagging as I go, Whump, no beta we die like men, or at least attempted angst
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-11-29
Updated: 2020-06-04
Packaged: 2021-02-26 05:35:46
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 3
Words: 2,844
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/21608416
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FarFetchedFiction/pseuds/FarFetchedFiction
Summary: Remus does not always see things as they are in reality.
Comments: 10
Kudos: 125





	1. the start

“I didn’t... I d-didn’t...”

Roman woke up. There had been someone.. crying. Crying? Wait, what time was it..?

“P-please, stop, nonono..-“

Was that..?

“..Remus? What—?”

Roman looked to the side to see a shaking, sobbing Remus.

“R-Roman.. R-R-Roman, please, wake up, w-wake up..!”

“Remus..? I’m awake..? What do you..—“

Suddenly, Remus fell to his knees. He began shaking more violently, his words barely escaping past the loud sobs.

“Roman! Please! I-It’s not funny anymore! Y-y-you can get up now! P-please, stop!”

Roman was confused, but something was clearly wrong. He’d never seen Remus act like this before. Is this what Patton had warned him about?

“Remus—“

“I-I didn’t mean to..! I-I.. I didn’t w-want to!”

More crying. Roman sat up, concern showing more and more.

“Remus.. Remus, what happened..?”

Remus finally looked up. His eyes were bloodshot, and tears were still streaming down his face, hair a mess.

“Y-you-! You’re.. h-how are you-? You’re.. you’re bleeding so much! W-wha— you shouldn’t.. you shouldn’t have been able t-to survive..!? A..are you a zombie..?!”

Roman’s worried look quickly melted into a laugh, before realising.. he wasn’t joking. Did he seriously think Roman was dead? And.. 

“Bleeding..? I’m.. I’m not bleeding. Remus, what’s going on—“

“Y-you are! You are! I can see it, and I can touch it and it’s everywhere!

“That’s not..”

Remus looked to the side for a second, panicked, yet pensive... until suddenly, his face changed, as if struck with a realisation.

Remus picked his hand up off the floor, and reached it out to Roman’s face. Roman flinched slightly, but, although confused, let Remus do it. He felt like he needed to.

Remus pulled his hand away from Roman’s face, just.. staring at it, confused.

“I.. I can’t feel the blood. I.. I can see it, but.. I can’t f-feel... s-so..” Remus just.. sighed. “..s-so that’s what t-this is then.”

“Huh..?”

Remus stood up, trembling.  
He took a deep breath in, keeping his eyes shut.

“Remus, can you please—“

“I-It wasn’t real. It wasn’t real. I’m.. I’m okay. I.. I didn’t do anything insane, I just.. am insane.”

“Remus—“

“It’s cool. That’s fine. I’m perfectly happy with th—“

“Remus, for the love of god, tell me what happened! I can’t help you if you’re just mumbling to yourself!”

Remus was caught off guard by his brother. Wrapping his arms around himself, he opened his eyes, and looked at Roman.

“When we split.. I.. I-I don’t know what happened. Y.. you got the best parts. The.. good parts. I got stuck with.. nightmares. Delusions. And.. I’m pretty sure this...” He looked back down at his hand. “..is a hallucination. Great. Something else I have to deal with. Just.. great.”

“..God, Remus..”

“It.. it is what it is. It’s never really.. quiet, now. My mind’s constantly racing. I-I’m.. I’m so scared of all these thoughts, Roman. They’re all terrible, they’re about you, or the others.. about terrible, terrible things.”

Roman sighed, and stood up from out of his bed. He gave Remus a look of pity, before pulling him into an embrace.

“There’s no need to be scared.”

“But.. I-I still am, Roman.”

“Remus.. It’s alright. I trust you. You would never do anything to hurt me. I know that. We’re brothers.”

“Roman.. do.. do you really believe that?”

“I do.”

“..Promise?”

“...Yeah. Promise.”


	2. the fall

“Hey Roman?”

“..Yeah?”

“How many times do you think it takes me smashing my arm with a brick to break it?”

—

Ever since the first incident, Remus’ mind had been slowly crumbling.

Remus lost more and more of his hold on what was real and wasn’t. At one point, he had decided to stop trying to tell the difference. If his mind made everything a joke, might as well treat it as one, no?

No longer were Roman and Remus best friends. Roman had bonded with the light sides. Remus had been cast to the side, and had clung to Deceit.

But, no matter what happened, they had always shared a room. And yes, Roman had seen a few.. strange things before. 

But Remus, on the floor and shaking, holding a brick in one hand and resting his other arm on the floor was definitely one of the worst ones.

“Remus— what on Earth are you trying to do?”

“Oh, it’s quite simple, Roman! Just conducting a small experiment! It’s quiiiiiite scientific— I have a hypothesis and everything! Logan would be so proud of me, right? Ah, it brings a tear to my eye!”  
Remus laughed manically, eyes darting around. He hadn’t thought of any particularly.. nice location. The room was in its default state... blank. Empty. Roman would’ve came up with something better. Roman was always the better brother, right?

“Remus, this is insane. What are you trying to do?”  
Roman looked... severely uncomfortable. He cared for Remus— definitely, but a lot of his.. exploits, were just empty, meaningless thoughts. He still hadn’t harmed anyone. So what was this?

“Uh, what did I juuuust say? I’m gonna destroy my arm until it bleeds and the bones shatter!”

“..Why?” Roman tensed up. He never liked Remus’.. manner of speaking.

_Break your arm break your arm hey wouldn’t it be fun if you broke every bone in your body break your arm break it now break it now you fucking idiot do it do it do i- _  
“Just because it seemed fun! Does there reaaaaalllllyyyy need to be an explanation for every single little itty bitty thing?”  
Remus’ words echoed through the blank room as he laughed. But it wasn’t funny. At least, not to Roman.__

____

____

“Remus, I thought you were past this. Here, let me—“  
Roman kneeled next to him, and tried to take the brick out of Remus’ hand calmly. But the dark side had other plans. 

Slapping Roman’s hand away, he points at Roman’s face, arm shaking.  
“Don’t FUCKING touch me, Roman. Touch me, and I’ll break all your fucking teeth, and your smile will be more ragged than the spikes you’ll eventually be impaled on, Roman! Ahahah!”

Remus didn’t even seem to be phased by anything he was saying anymore. That was.. what scared him. Roman was.. scared of him? Wait.. what? That wasn’t meant to happen. They were siblings, and yes, they had grown apart, but was he.. scared? He was actually scared?

“Remus.. w..what’s gotten into you? You.. you just need to put the brick down, okay? I.. I can get someone for you to calm you down, if you need. Just.. just think, okay?”  
Roman was reeling. He wasn’t used to.. this much from Remus. 

“Think? Think?!”  
Remus’ smile fell.  
“I’ve been thinking non-stop ever since what he did to us! What he did to me! And look where that’s got me! I’m curled up on the floor talking to the person I H-HATE the most about how I’m going to destroy myself! And I’m thinking it’s a GOOD IDEA! What a fucking good deal I’ve been left with for THINKING!”  
Remus was yelling. He couldn’t tell what was running down his face at this point. Maybe it was tears. Maybe it was Roman’s blood. Maybe it wasn’t anything at all. He didn’t care.

“As I fell to pieces, you just watched! You watched as this happened, and you did nothing! You just stayed with him!”

“I.. I don’t understand. I’ve always tried to—“ 

“Do you not remember what he did to us, Roman? He split us! He’s the reason I’m stuck like THIS!”

“I’m... so confused. Who.. are you talking about?”

“Wha..what? You... ahah.. you don’t fucking remember? Oh my GOD, this is absolutely RICH! Why do you think we split Roman, huh? Why do you think Romulus disappeared?”

Roman was completely silent. He.. didn’t remember. The split was fuzzy for him. He’d always been under the impression that the split was a good, mutual thing. Remus’... situation was unrelated to the split.

“...You don’t remember. You don’t remember. You don’t remember what he did to us. He was scared of us. What we would do to Thomas. We were terrible, so he split us up and sent me away.”

Remus, for the first time, was still. Without putting the brick down, he looked at his free hand.

“..Well. This is a bit awkward, isn’t it?”

“Remus—“

“..No, it’s fine. Just.. just.. just give him a message for me. Tell him.. I’ll be back when he’s the least prepared. And if he wanted me to be the villain.. he could’ve just asked, eh?”

Roman gulped.  
“I.. I still don’t know what or who you’re talking about, but..”

“...Hah. Hahahah. HahahaahAAHHHAHAHAHAH!”  
Remus raised the hand holding the brick and smashed it against his resting arm.  
“PATTON! MORALITY! HIM! THAT’S HIM!”  
Again. And again. And again.  
“HE DID THIS! HE CAUSED THIS!”  
And over and over again.

After what felt like an eternity, Remus tossed them brick to the side. His arm was completely destroyed. The skin had been torn away, leaving the damaged muscle and shattered bone clearly visible. Blood had gotten everywhere, all over his face, clothes, and his hands. Especially his hands. 

Roman was there too. He was still standing there.. paralysed. Thinking.  
Remus... acted on one of his thoughts. He said he wouldn’t. But there he was, battered and bleeding by his own will.

And.. Patton? Was he really saying Patton had caused the split? That.. that made no sense. Patton wouldn’t do something like this. He’s morality for crying out loud. That’s not—

“Well, that was quite a stress reliever! Woah, you can see the veins! This is so cool! Roman, are you going to just stand there?”

“....!?”

“No response? Okay, well, I think this is an appropriate time to mention this! I feel like we’ve grown apart, so I’m leaving! Your room is awfully limiting, and I feel like I can’t really be myself, you know? So I’m moving in with Dee! I hope there’s no hard feelings, okay?”

Remus hopped up, arm still bleeding heavily. Smiling, he waved goodbye to Roman, and left the room.

The brick was the only thing that could have shown Remus was ever there.

Picking the brick up, Roman changed the room back into his kingdom. As the wind slowly picked up again, Roman winded back and threw the brick into a nearby lake, and walked away.

That was the day Roman learned to fear Remus.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> I think this is probably really badly written but like whatever
> 
> Incase this is dumb in conclusion:  
> • Patton split Romulus because of true creativity not being to his moral standards  
> • Abandoned Remus + kept him burdened with the ‘bad parts’ and tried to keep Roman as the one true creativity   
> • Remus knows Patton split them, Roman doesn’t


	3. the consequence

“Remus, for crying out loud, what do you want at this ungodly hour?”

—

Ever since Remus left his room, he had been camping out with Janus. He had his own corner of the room, and he felt truly welcomed.

All Janus felt was annoyance.

Yes, the company was welcome. It was nice to have someone that _talked_ to him, of course, but.. Remus? Really?

Janus had woken up to Remus bouncing up and down excitedly next to him, clutching his arm.

“I did it, Dee! You won’t believe what I did! I was all HAHAHAHAHAHAH and Roman was all like AAAARGHH!!!! And look!” He pulled his arm up to show it completely destroyed. “Isn’t this cool?”

Janus blinked, before rushing out of bed and holding Remus’ arm up for him. It was terrible. There was muscle visible, and the blood, oh god, there was so much blood. Sides couldn’t sustain damage unless they truly believed it was real, but.. Oh. Remus did. He had never even considered Remus would continue to believe his.. unsavoury thoughts to this extent.  
“Remus, did Roman do t—“

“Oh, of COURSE not! That coward could never hurt me— not physically, anyway! This was aaaallllllllll me! With a cool brick, too!”

Janus didn’t know how to respond. He.. he needed to bandage it up. Thankfully, they were in his room, and Janus always thought of the worst, but unlike _a certain side_ , he was actually prepared for it.

After going to grab bandages, he sat Remus down and got him to hold his arm out.  
Disinfecting the damaged arm, he wrapped a bandage around it.

“Y’know, Dee, I doubt that’ll help! I fucked my arm up MAJORLY! That’s just a baby’s bandage wrapping!”

“I don’t even need to do this, Remus, but you don’t want to undo this yourself, so someone needs to take care of you before you get worse.”  
Janus finished bandaging his arm. It wasn’t anything good, but they were sides. He didn’t even technically NEED this, but it felt.. wrong.. not to.

Remus moved his newly bandaged arm about. His smile grew, before it switched into more of a grimace.  
“Wow, that hurts, ha!”

“You can just.. not. You can change forms, Remus. Why do you keep it like that?”

“Because.. I deserve it, Dee! Isn’t that obvious?” 

Janus slumped slightly. He was rarely at a loss for words, but Remus.. was not one to reason with. That wouldn’t stop him from trying, though.

“Why on Earth would you deserve something like this, Remus?”

“Because I’m the woooooorst! I’m terrible, I don’t deserve to liiiiive, and any pain is just what’s coming to me! I thought that’d be obvious, Mr Jekyll n’ lies!”

“Remus-“

“Thomas doesn’t even know who I am! He’d be way too hurt by my existence, so it’s for the best, obviously!”

Remus said everything with a cheery tone. Janus never understood how he did, but it somehow made everything he said even worse. He would never say that, though. Instead, he hatched a plan to get everything back that Remus lost.

“...Remus, do you ever want to get _him_ back for the split?”

Remus just laughed in response.  
“Of course! Patton took everything from me! Aren’t I terrible?”

“...Don’t tell anyone who told you, but I’ve heard that Thomas wants to be more honest with himself.”

Remus, for the first time, smiled genuinely. He started to pay attention.

————

Roman knocked on the door to Patton’s room. He.. had to have been lying. There was no way Patton caused the split. Why would he..?

Before Roman could question more, the door creaked open to a tired Patton.

Rubbing his eyes and adjusting his glasses, he smiled at Roman.  
“Hey, kiddo, why are you up so late?”

His warm expression fell as he saw Roman’s face. It was.. empty. His eyes stared blankly, as he hugged himself.  
“Roman, you look like you’ve seen a ghost. Is everything okay? Do you want to come inside?”

“Did you do it?”

Patton froze at the question. Roman’s expression hadn’t changed at all. Surely he didn’t mean...

“I don’t know what you’re talking about, kiddo.”

“Did you split Romulus? Did _you cause the split, Patton?_ ”

_No. He knew. Roman.. Roman had found out. Okay. Okay, Patton, think, what do you say? Lying is wrong, but admitting it would hurt Roman— Patton, think! Speak! Say something!_

“...I’m sorry, Roman.”

_No, be more specific, damnit! Patton, you’re terrible, why can’t you just tell the truth! You did it! Why don’t you own up? Why?_

“...Is that a yes?”  
Roman’s question was only met with a shame filled nod.

No.

Roman was in disbelief. He had never questioned the split- only assuming it was something that occurred naturally- not— not something forced. Let alone by Patton! Morality!

Letting his arms drop to his side, he let out a whimper, which quickly turned to sobbing.

Patton didn’t know what to do. Roman was crying. Roman was crying because of something he did. That.. that wasn’t meant to happen. This whole thing wasn’t meant to happen. He was never meant to know— if he hadn’t done it, there would be nothing to hide- but he had to, Thomas was in dange—

“Why?”

The light side’s spiralling thoughts were interrupted, and he was immediately grounded. Roman. That’s what mattered now.

Roman, tears running down his face, teeth clenched and arms shaking, asked again.

“Why did you do it?”

Patton didn’t know how to reply. It was in the past. He had never expected to have to explain, yes it was something he wasn’t proud of, but it was needed!

“I.. I had to. Those thoughts, everything Romulus was thinking, it was harming Thomas! They weren’t right! I had to.. I had to STOP it, Roman!”

“So you just left Remus to the side? You left me **incomplete!?** ” Roman screamed, shoving Patton back.

Flinching, Patton sighed. With a neutral face, he reached an arm out to Roman.

“Roman.. I’m sorry. It was the best thing at the time. I.. I know it wasn’t a great idea now. I can’t take it back. But.. I love who you are now. And who you are now is.. _good._ Thomas.. is good. Okay..?”

“..Okay, Patton.”

Roman pushed Patton’s arm away, before falling into his arms, holding him close.

Patton was startled by his embrace. He... he accepted it. Okay, this was a start.  
“C’mon, kiddo. Wanna head into my room to talk?”

“..I.. I think I just need some time to think. Alone.. but, thank you, Patton.”

Pulling away, Roman smiled softly, before shutting his eyes.  
“Farewell, Patton.” Roman muttered, before heading to his room.

...And _his_ room alone.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> AAAAND That’s the end of this fic! This is my first genuine multichapter fic so it’s probably not very good  
> This took so long I’m so sorry my interest in tss dwindled a lot but now I’m full swing in the brainrot  
> Psst I have socials - Filthy Fajita on YouTube and Egot1stical/wariolovemail on insta!  
> Fun fact I wrote remus’ half of the chapter LOOOONG ago I just never got around to writing Roman’s half because patton is hard to write  
> Okay rambling over thanks guys mwah

**Author's Note:**

> i dont really write so if this is bad im sowwy


End file.
